The Renaissance Vinoy ballroom used for the press conference to announce the start of the Stuart Sternberg Era had emptied when a long-time member of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays front office summed up the day's excitement.
"It was like we were awarded the franchise all over again," he said.
That was October 6, 2005.
The Lightning had just hung their 2004 Stanley Cup banner from the rafters the night before. Who knew then that after three seasons, the Rays would hang a championship banner of their own?
Talk about new beginnings. Sternberg gave the hapless franchise the equivalent of a do-over.
His ownership group cleaned up Tropicana Field, took a chance on a rookie general manager and a forward-thinking rookie manager, pumped a few million into the team's payroll and, voilà, the Rays ended the decade as a model for small-market teams hoping to eat at the adult table.
All it took was a where-did-that-come-from season in 2008 capped by a division title and an
American League pennant and an 84-win season in 2009.
Actually, the Rays ended the decade by trading for a much-needed closer, which means they head into the new decade as a playoff contender in the strong American League East.
It wasn't like this at the dawn of the 2000s.
The Rays kicked up the payroll 10 years ago by signing or trading for Greg Vaughn and Vinny Castilla. Add them to a lineup that already included Fred McGriff and Jose Canseco and you had the "Hit Show."
The show flopped.
The organization was still paying off those contracts well into the Sternberg Era.
Meanwhile, the Devil Rays were punchlines for David Letterman.
Hal McRae, who replaced manager Larry Rothschild early in 2001, was hired for his hard-nosed, old-school ways. McRae once spent a postgame interview session laughing at his team.
Lou Piniella, hired in 2003 for his hard-nosed, old-school ways, replaced McRae and received a hero's welcome when he returned home to manage the hometown team. Piniella lasted three seasons and burned a few bridges on his way out of town.
The Rays spent the first eight years of the decade in last place seven times and next to last place once.
Their best stretch of baseball occurred in 2004 when they became the first team in baseball history to fall 18 games under .500 then rise above .500, but the period was largely overshadowed by the Lightning's run to the Stanley Cup title.
The Rays finished with the worst record in baseball in 2006.
They finished with the worst record in baseball in 2007.
They went to the World Series in 2008.
Players are quick to say it's not how you start a season that is important, but how you finish.
The same can be said for the 2000s.
The Rays changed managers three times, changed uniforms three times, changed ownership once, changed pitching coaches and hitting coaches and the start times for games.
Somehow, they managed to change the perception of the organization.
Here are the Top 10 moments of the 2000s:
Aki steps on second!
The Rays won Game 7 of the American League Championship Series on Oct. 19, 2008 with a 3-1 victory against the Boston Red Sox that ended when Akinori Iwamura fielded a ground ball and stepped on second base for the forceout that sent the Rays to the World Series.
Who ever thought in a division ruled by the Yankees and Red Sox that the Rays would beat back both teams for the division title then outlast the Red Sox for the AL pennant?
It was a white-knuckler of a series that saw the Rays jump to a 3-1 lead in games before the Red Sox came to life with a historic comeback in Game 5 and another win in Game 6 to even things.
The world was introduced to rookie David Price, who earned his first big-league win and save in the series. His 1 1/3 innings of relief in Game 7 is the stuff of legend.
Matt Garza was the ALCS MVP with two wins, and B.J. Upton showed he can play big in a big series when he took aim at Fenway Park's fabled Green Monster during the middle three games of the series.
Of course, you win the ALCS and you head to the World Series, so ...
And now for your American League Champion Tampa Bay Rays ...
Rays pitcher J.P. Howell couldn't believe the World Series logo affixed to his cap and jersey. Baseball fans couldn't believe the Fall Classic would begin under the Trop's catwalks.
But there were the Rays, splitting the first two games of the 2008 World Series with the Phillies before heading to rainy, chilly Philadelphia, where a three-game sweep ended the storybook season on a downer.
Still, the year before the Rays had the worst record in baseball.
Now, they had the most wins by any major league team.
Longoria squeezes it for the final out ...
Evan Longoria caught up with a pop fly in front of the stands in shallow left field at 7:22 p.m. on Sept. 20, 2008 for the final out of the Rays 7-2 win against the Twins.
With the victory, the Rays clinched the first playoff berth in team history.
The moment touched off a mad on-field celebration and a champagne shower in the clubhouse as the players and coaches emptied bottles of Mumm Champagne over the heads of anyone who was in the room.
"This is just the beginning," pitcher J.P. Howell yelled.
It really was.
The Rays would celebrate like that three more times that fall.
"It's as it should be," manager Joe Maddon said. "When you come to spring training and you put everything together, this is the moment you're looking for, not to come in second, not to say, 'Nice try.' You're working to get to this point. This is just the beginning."
The Rays would win the AL East in Detroit and open the postseason at home against the Chicago White Sox.
Longoria would start the ALDS against the White Sox with home runs in his first two at-bats of Game 1 and the Rays were on their way.
Mr. Sternberg comes to town
There was a scene toward the end of the 2008 regular season that went largely unnoticed by those standing near home plate before a game with the Red Sox.
Former owner Vince Naimoli, who came to the Trop in mid-September for an interview with a national columnist before a night game, walked slowly off the field as Stuart Sternberg stood next to the batting cage watching Longoria spray line drives around the field.
Not many noticed Naimoli's exit. Everyone was too busy watching the future.
Naimoli gets props for bringing the franchise to Tampa Bay. But the Rays never made any progress under his ownership.
Sternberg's ownership group took over immediately after the 2005 season and pumped life into the organization.
The Rays shed themselves of big contracts and committed to player development. They built around the kids and added low-cost, low-risk pieces.
The change could be seen on the field during the final two months of the 2007 season. The Rays were holding on to leads. They were competitive.
The Rays were a better team. How much better? Most hoped for a .500 season in 2008.
Rookies in charge
One of Sternberg's first moves was to move Andrew Friedman into the role of general manager, a position Friedman had never held but prepped for during the previous two seasons. Friedman and new team president Matt Silverman then took a chance on Joe Maddon, giving the longtime foot soldier in the Angels organization his first full-time managing job at the major league level.
Friedman quickly proved an excellent judge of talent, seeing potential in players like Willy Aybar and Cliff Floyd. He drafted Evan Longoria and David Price and dealt former future of the organization Delmon Young for a much-needed starting pitcher and shortstop. The two quickly became major pieces of a championship team.
Maddon took the heat for a pair of last-place finishes, raising the ire of Rays fans with his positive outlook. Hey, someone had to see the flowers growing in the empty lot overrun by weeds.
That was Maddon: focusing on the things his players were doing right.
By 2008, Maddon had a clubhouse full of players who bought into his sunny outlook and played relaxed.
Times had changed.
Good-bye Devil, Hello blue
The Rays displayed their new uniforms, logo and colors after the 2007 season. The word "Devil" was gone. So was the green in favor of blue, a more baseball-traditional color, according to Sternberg.
The fans loved the new look.
The players, too.
"They say you play the way you feel, and we definitely feel good in these uniforms," Carl Crawford said in May 2008.
They played good, too. All the way to the World Series.
The Rays traded who?
Sternberg stood on a stage placed in shallow centerfield at Al Lang Field on the afternoon of Nov. 28, 2007, trying to sell the area on his proposal for an open-air ball park.
Meanwhile, Friedman was seen off to the side talking into his Blackberry.
A few hours later, the Rays announced the biggest trade in the team's history: right fielder Delmon Young and infielder Brendan Harris to the Twins for pitcher Matt Garza and shortstop Jason Bartlett.
In an instant, the Rays became a better team.
Garza would win 11 games during the regular season and two more against Boston in the ALCS to earn ALCS MVP honors.
Bartlett would solidify a leaky infield, help Iwamura make the transition to second base and give the pitching staff the confidence that a ground ball will be turned into an out.
Meet us in St. Louis
The fruits of the 2008 postseason was a carload of Rays who were voted to or named to represent the American League in the 2009 All-Star Game in St. Louis.
Maddon, by virtue of managing the American League team in the '08 World Series, was the AL manager last July.
Longoria was voted by the fans as the starting third baseman, but was scratched from the game because of an infected right ring finger.
Bartlett received the second-most votes by an AL shortstop. Crawford was voted to the team by his peers. Maddon used his pick to add Ben Zobrist to the roster. Carlos Peña replaced Dustin Pedroia, who skipped the game to be with his pregnant wife.
Crawford was named the game's MVP because of his leaping catch that robbed Brad Hawpe of a go-ahead home run in the seventh inning.
The American League won again, and the Rays had their fingerprints all over the victory.
Baldelli's return
Rocco Baldelli's career was almost cut short by a mitochondrial disorder that caused extreme fatigue and pain in his legs.
How he kept himself together as he broke the news during a press conference in a tiny room under Al Lang Stadium during March of 2008 is anybody's guess.
Yet, Baldelli made it back to the Rays that season and delivered a run-scoring double in the fifth inning of Game 7 of the ALCS that gave the Rays a 3-1 lead against the Red Sox that they would not surrender.
His home run in seventh inning of Game 5 of the World Series tied that rain-delayed game at 3-3.
It would be Baldelli's last hit as a Ray and the Rays last run of '08.
Dan Johnson's Boston blast
There were plenty of great moments during the 2000s.
The day Lou Piniella was hired as manager was one.
The day Randy Winn ended a 15-game losing streak with a home run was another.
Steve Trachsel beat Pedro Martinez 1-0 at Fenway Park in 2000.
None rank as high as Dan Johnson's ninth-inning, pinch-hit home run off Jonathon Papelbon on the night of Sept. 9, 2008.
Called up from Triple A Durham that day, Johnson was caught in traffic and arrived late to Fenway Park.
The Red Sox, who entered the day a half-game back of the first-place Rays, took a 4-3 lead in the bottom of the eighth inning. Papelbon was called on to protect the lead and pitch the defending World Series champions back into first place.
Never happened.
Johnson's only swing of the at-bat produced a towering home run that burned a hole through Red Sox Nation and landed in the stands behind the bullpens in right-center field.
An RBI double by Dioner Navarro scored Fernando Perez with the winning run that gave the Rays a 1 1/2 game cushion and their first win in Boston that season.
Who knows what would have become of the '08 pennant race had the Red Sox moved into first place?
We do know this; the Red Sox didn't, and the Rays went on to make history.